Port Renfrew is a tiny remote community on the West side of Vancouver Island. If it might seem to readers of Coffin Cove, the first in a series of crime novels set on the Island, that Port Renfrew was the inspiration for Coffin Cove – well, they’d be partially correct. The fictional town is a mixture of several small communities so locals will recognize several “landmarks”.
The first novel opens with familiar (to Islanders) antagonism between environmentalists and the fishing industry, and touches on the real history of the War in the Woods or Clayoquot protests of the nineties.
The Clayoquot protests were sparked by clear-cutting practices by timber companies (unfettered by government regulations) in and around indigenous territories on the most western part of Vancouver Island known as Clayoquot Sound.
Although the 1993 protests are most famous, not only for the 900 arrests, but also because of the successful outcomes for the protestors, clashes had been occurring for decades in this area.
In 1984, the first opposition to logging companies in the Sound occurred, when members of Friends of Clayoquot Sound and First Nations groups set up blockades on the logging roads leading to Meares Island. The island was important to First Nations communities because it contained main sources of drinking water for the area. First Nation people have never been completely opposed to logging, but the unregulated and (in their opinion) short-sighted attempt to maximise profit with little respect of the environment was enough for protests and blockades to be established, followed by years of court battles.
In mid-1993, the most significant protests occurred after the provincial government introduced a controversial land use plan for Clayoquot Sound. Both environmentalists and the indigenous people who made up the entire Clayoquot Sound community began a series of protests which culminated in mass arrests.
Although these protests eventually led to changes in legislation, and logging practices, the “largest act of civil disobedience in Canadian history” was not with controversy and negative impacts on the local population, many of whom depended on the forestry companies for employment.
So now let me circle back to Port Renfrew. In late February, conflict between protestors and the forestry industry, touted as “War in the Woods 2.0” at Fairy Creek watershed, just outside Port Renfrew were set to face off in court.
At the time of writing this blog, the outcome is not yet known.
It’s too easy to come down firmly on one side or the other. Black or white, no shades of grey. But real life isn’t like that, and if we try harder, it doesn’t have to be a zero-sum game. A positive outcome for environmentalists can go hand in hand with a profitable resource industry.
In this age of divisiveness, I hope I managed a balanced view when I wrote Coffin Cove. And for the purists out there, apologies for taking liberties with history.
If you haven’t yet read Coffin Cove, you can get your copy here.